Thursday, 14 July 2011

Yesterday I headed over to Poppytalk to write about my experiences with British brand Habitat, which has recently entered administration. While three central London stores will remain open, the rights to the brand and the three remaining stores has been bought my the Home Retail Group, so it's like the company's products will take on a new direction. Despite feeling that the company had lost it's way in recent years, I've always been an enthusiast of the iconic brand and there's no denying that Habitat played a large part in inspiring me to pursue a career in prop styling. That said, I do believe that closing was the right decision. Head over here to read my thoughts on the closure. What do you think about Habitat closing?

10 comments:

I so agree with you Will. It's a real shame! In Europe, we cant deny how influential Terence Conran and Habitat were to the world of design.I know for sure that if it wasn't for Habitat's cool concept and designs a few years back that lured me into the creative & inspiring world of design, we wouldn't have launched our own concept store BODIE and FOU and I think it's really sad that such a brand is going down

Habitat was the mecca for young, relatively impecunious design and design-conscious. In the 1970s everything in my kitchen - French porcelain, "bistro" cutlery, even tea towels - was from Habitat. At the time there was nothing like it. The Habitat cafe was the Saturday afternoon place to go if one was gay. That soon ended when it was made very clear we we not wanted. From then onwards I never went back to shop at Habitat.

It's really a shame -- I have always been inspired by Habitat. I love their styling and photography. They also played a prominent role in my inspiration boards - and my blog http://www.lifestylefiles.blogspot.com. I hope they find their focus in a new partnership & come back in a fresh and new way. Change isn't always a bad thing.